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Clarke insists West Brom still on track despite Fulham defeat

West Bromwich Albion boss Steve Clarke is relaxed after their first league defeat of the campaign at Fulham.
An opening day 3-0 win over Liverpool set the tone for a superb start to the campaign as a draw at Tottenham and win over Everton followed.

"We had a really good start to the season," he said. "Then we lost at Fulham - which a lot of teams do - and didn't quite reach the standard that we expected to reach. But it's just a defeat, it's part and parcel of football and we'll move on to the next game.

"I'm not sure it was an exceptional start to the season. It was a good start. We're a good team, I've said that all along.

"We expected to start well and we did that. We've had a defeat and suddenly everyone wants to turn it around. We just approach the next game like we've approached the others and hopefully our performance will be good enough to get the result.

"I'm not sure too many people were getting carried away. I think the media might look at it and go 'that was really impressive' but the important thing is that in the confines of this building, our group, we knew we'd had a good start but I kept saying there would be disappointing days to come.

"Unfortunately it arrived a bit earlier than we wanted it to but it's arrived and we'll just deal with it now."